At a glance January 2015 Overview of South Korea's political landscape Since the full democratisation of the country, with the launch of free and fair elections and the reinstatement of a functioning parliament at the end of the 1980s, South Korea's political scene has been dominated largely by two main parties, although their names and composition have repeatedly changed. At the end of 2012, Park Geun-hye, a popular figure from the ruling conservative party, was elected the first woman president in the history of the country. Presidential system Since 1987, when the country's constitution was amended for the last time, the Republic of Korea (South Korea) has entered a period of full democratisation known as the 'Sixth Republic'. The president is chosen by direct popular election, in a single round of voting, for a five-year term and is not allowed to run for a second mandate. Being at the apex of the executive branch, the president has to carry out some major functions, be the symbol of the nation, the head of state, commander of the armed forces and the highest representative in foreign relations. Moreover, the president may propose legislative bills to the parliament or express views to the assembly in person or in writing. In performing these tasks the president is assisted by the State Council, a Cabinet made up of 15 to 30 members, appointed by the president upon recommendations by the prime minister, and also by a number of advisory organisations and executive agencies. The prime minister is designated by the president and must be approved by parliament. However, the presidency's prerogatives are increasingly regarded as excessively strong compared to those of the Cabinet or of parliament, and some critics have called for constitutional reform to allow a more balanced division of powers. South Korea's first woman leader At the presidential elections in December 2012, with a turnout of 75.8% – the highest in the past 15 years – Park Geun-Hye was elected with 51.6% of the votes cast, the highest share won by any candidate since South Korea's transition to democracy in 1987. The first woman president in a still largely patriarchal and conservative country, Park is the daughter of General Park Chung-hee, who ruled South Korea for almost two decades until his assassination in 1979, after coming to power through a military coup in 1961. After her mother's tragic death in a failed attack on her father in 1974, she served as an acting first lady for five years, hence acquiring a political profile of her own. Park has apologised for the human-rights violations which occurred under her father's regime. After taking office in February 2013 at the Cheong Wa Dae ('Blue House', the presidency's official seat), Park appointed as prime minister Chung Hong-Won, a former public prosecutor and prominent lawyer. In April 2014, following the ferry sinking in which more than 300 people died, the premier offered to resign. However, after two unsuccessful attempts to replace him, Park decided to confirm Chung as prime minister. She has recently created two new ministries, dealing with public safety, security and personnel management issues, in order to improve disaster prevention and control, and to cut red tape. This can be seen as the response to harsh criticism targeted at public authorities for their inefficiency and mistakes in the ferry catastrophe. Nevertheless, the disaster has taken its toll on the president's popularity, as according to some opinion polls her approval rating has declined from around 60% after a year in office to around 45% in October 2014. The parliament South Korea has a unicameral system. The Kuk Hoe (National Assembly) is composed of 300 members serving a four-year term: 246 are directly elected from single-seat district constituencies, while the remaining 54 members are chosen through a proportional representation system. Legislation is approved by EPRS | European Parliamentary Research Service Author: Lorenzo Costantini, Members' Research Service PE 545.720 Disclaimer and Copyright: The content of this document is the sole responsibility of the author and any opinions expressed therein do not necessarily represent the official position of the European Parliament. It is addressed to the Members and staff of the EP for their parliamentary work. Reproduction and translation for non-commercial purposes are authorised, provided the source is acknowledged and the European Parliament is given prior notice and sent a copy. © European Union, 2015. [email protected] – http://www.eprs.ep.parl.union.eu (intranet) – http://www.europarl.europa.eu/thinktank (internet) – http://epthinktank.eu (blog) EN EPRS South Korea's political landscape overview a majority of the members present. The South Korean president can object to a bill passed by the National Assembly and ask to reconsider it; however, if the parliament approves it once more by at least two thirds of its members, the bill becomes law. The president cannot dissolve the parliament, but it can initiate an impeachment procedure against the head of state. A motion of impeachment passes only if two-thirds or more of the members approve it. Two main political forces The Saenuri Party (New Frontier Party) was established in February 2012, after the conservative Grand National Party (GNP) merged with a smaller political formation. The Saenuri undertook to put more emphasis on an efficient welfare system and to distance itself from the GNP's traditional pro-big business stance, pledging to reduce the excessive economic influence of the powerful chaebol (family-controlled conglomerates such as Hyundai or Samsung). In the National Assembly elections held in April 2012 the party won 152 seats, giving it only a slight majority. After the Saenuri candidate Park Geun-Hye was elected president in December 2012, the party scored quite well in successive local elections and parliamentary by-elections in June and July 2014, and now holds a slightly increased majority in the parliament (158 of 300 seats). The Saenuri-backed President Park's government can thus pour efforts into the economic development plan, announced before the ferry disaster. The plan is called the '474 Vision' since it pursues three main objectives: raising the GDP growth to 4.0%, increasing the employment rate to 70% and boosting annual per capita income to US$40 000. The three-year strategy aims at promoting domestic consumption to reduce South Korea's dependence on exports, supporting small, private companies and reforming public firms; however, it has also been criticised for being too ambitious and unfocused, as around 100 projects have been planned for a limited time-frame. Concerning relations with North Korea, in March 2014 President Park gave an important pro-reunification speech in Dresden, proposing to create exchange and cooperation offices for joint projects, and also to increase humanitarian, financial and infrastructure support for Pyongyang. This is part of Park's 'trust- building' measures which are also supported by the main opposition party, as confirmed in the latest inter- parliamentary meeting between the EP and South Korea's National Assembly. Nevertheless, the South Korean government is concerned about the nuclear tests conducted by North Korea (the third one was in February 2013) and strives to achieve the denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula. The New Politics Alliance for Democracy (NPAD) was founded in March 2014, when the main opposition Democratic Party (DP) was reorganised and renamed after joining forces with a smaller political formation led by Ahn Cheol-soo, an independent candidate in the 2012 presidential race. Ahn Cheol-soo and Kim Han- gil, the former leader of the DP, initially co-chaired the new party. A popular businessman in the software industry, Ahn Cheol-soo was regarded as a maverick in South Korean politics, but his decision to join with the DP surprised and even disappointed many of his supporters, in particular young people. Although the NPAD vowed to 'break the old, existing political system', presenting itself as a more centrist-liberal alternative to the conservative Saenuri, so far it has failed to convince the electorate. In the 2012 National Assembly elections the Democratic United Party (DUP) – as the DP was previously named – had obtained 127 seats; however, the NPAD did not perform as well as expected in the 2014 local elections and parliamentary by- elections, when it acquired only a few more seats, and today it holds a total of 130 seats in the parliament. This defeat led the party's co-leaders to resign, and the NPAD should hold a national convention to elect a new leader in the first months of 2015. In recent months, however, taking advantage of the government's weak majority in parliament, the NPAD boycotted the National Assembly's sessions and resumed participation in parliamentary work only in October 2014, when a compromise was reached with the ruling party on a special bill establishing an official investigation into the April ferry sinking. The EU-South Korea Free Trade Agreement (FTA) entered into force in July 2011, and is the most ambitious and comprehensive FTA concluded by the EU so far. Although expectations of the benefits for South Korea were high, EU exports of goods to the country have increased in the first two years of implementation, but exports to the EU have actually declined, not least because of economic stagnation in Europe. However, some analysts recommend looking for the FTA's benefits in the longer term instead of concentrating on short-term results. Members' Research Service Page 2 of 2.